


mixtapes

by preromantics



Category: Speed Skating RPF, Sports RPF
Genre: M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2010-04-12
Updated: 2010-04-12
Packaged: 2017-10-08 21:49:57
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,376
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/79851
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/preromantics/pseuds/preromantics
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Which is why when JR bums rides to training from Apolo when they start really going at it for national team quals, he spends approximately half of each car ride wanting to stick his head out of the window and roll it back up.</i> Or: Apolo has awful music tastes, JR is not a girl, and the rest of the team sucks.</p>
            </blockquote>





	mixtapes

There was this point in JR's life where he realized the music on mainstream radio was pretty horrendously awful 98% of the time, and that sometimes older girls thought it was really cool when he said he was 'into the backwash Seattle scene, personally.'

To this day, he thinks it was a pretty life-changing point.

Apolo (and Simon and Jordan and even Travis, but at least they play along now) doesn't really think it was all that life-changing, and doesn't really care.

Which is why when JR bums rides to training when they start really going at it for national team quals, JR spends approximately half of each car ride wanting to stick his head out of the window and roll it back up.

"Don't be so morbid, kid," Apolo says when JR voices this opinion. "This song is really catchy." He reaches over to crank the radio volume up a little, swerving in to the median enough for JR to quickly wonder what would happen if Apolo managed to knock them both out of Olympics contention through the power of shitty music.

Party in the USA pumps a little louder through Apolo's actually pretty excellent speaker system, and JR slides further down into his seat when they hit the next light. Apolo sings along, off-key.

\--

So JR decides to make Apolo a CD -- _not_ a mixtape, because JR is not a girl, and he and Apolo are not "consummating their creepy ass relationship in the back of Apolo's ride" as Jordan so graphically illustrated during an early-morning McDonalds run.

It's just a CD of some good songs; there's some Arcade Fire and Beruit and some more local stuff like Blue Scholars just because at one point the CD started sounding like angry love songs, which JR is only into when he has the privacy of headphones and a subtlety titled playlist.

He pops it in when Apolo has the car off for gas one morning, stretched out in the passenger seat in work out sweats and wondering if Apolo will bring him tea from inside the gas station if he thinks about it hard enough in Apolo's general direction.

Apolo does end up bringing him tea, and when he turns the car on a heavy (but artistically and carefully and non-artificially auto-tuned, JR insists) beat filters through and Apolo raises an eyebrow and drives off anyway.

By the time they get to practice he's nodding his head along to a Sea Wolf song and JR feels mildly accomplished.

\--

It goes like that for a while. Two days worth of commutes to the rink there and back are easily enough for a full burned CD, so JR makes one about twice a week and pops it in the car and Apolo doesn't comment much. Sometimes his nods his head along or, much to JR's continued horror, starts to car dance, swerving around with little to no care for the fact they are on a highway.

(JR ran a last.fm similar songs search on that one when he got home and made sure not to include any car-dancing-inducing songs on his mixes from thereafter. It wasn't even a good dance song. Apolo is crazy.)

Despite the bouts of careless driving, the whole music thing goes pretty well. JR eventually runs out of good music for car rides and tapers off, but Apolo has all the mixtapes -- no, CDs, they aren't mixtapes because really, JR isn't a girl and the way his mouth gets dry and sometimes his calf muscles tense up when Apolo is focused on him doesn't mean he has a crush like a girl at all -- in his car and they rotate through them. They really aren't mixtapes.

\--

"Hey," Apolo says after a particularly grueling practice, reaching up to run a hand messily through JR's slick hair, "why haven't you been making me more mixtapes with those pretentious songs?"

(In the background, Travis and Jordan snort obnoxiously, like it's so funny, and it really isn't. JR doesn't turn around to glare but the noise of skin on skin when Simon reps for him and presumably smacks one of them is unsurprisingly satisfying.)

JR ducks his head down a little. "I'll make more," he says, "if you want – I wasn't sure."

"They're not always as good as the radio," Apolo says, cutting him off, "but make more."

When Apolo leaves to take a call, Jordan comes over and slaps JR on the back. "Props," he says, "I didn't think the mixtape as a point of wooing worked outside the 80s."

"Shut up," JR says, shoving at him, but he goes home and makes a mix of his favorite "I'm-pining-for-you-but-in-a-subtle-and-not-creepy-way" indie songs. He has a surprising amount of them.

–

Apolo picks JR up for practice when the sky is still streaked with sunrise gold, which means it's really too early to exist.

JR puts his CD in and tries not to alternately fall asleep against the dashboard while feeling self-conscious if Apolo looks like he's trying to listen to the lyrics of each song or something. He's probably just concentrating on the road or running an internal monologue on how to inspire himself, but still. JR definitely feels a little awkward shoved into a small, moving space with the guy he's been making mixtapes for months for and maybe been looking up to (or, in the past two years thanks to an awesome growth spurt, down to) for years.

"Okay," Apolo says after a while, driving the car off the highway to a gas station they don't usually stop at. "I didn't actually want another mixtape that much."

Which is kind of a douchey thing to say, in JR's opinion, because he'd asked and JR had taken at least an hour putting together this one. "You asked," JR reminds him.

"I think it's – cute," Apolo says, and JR scrunches up his face, "the way you have all your weird music. So I indulged you."

"It's not weird," JR says, sinking down into his seat, "and you have your weird baked good thing that we – I – indulge all the time, so --"

Apolo rolls his eyes. "I didn't mean it like that, calm down."

JR makes a noise through his nose that probably makes him sound as young as he feels.

Apolo pinches the bridge of his nose. "You know how in 80s movies when someone would make a mixtape for another person --"

JR sits up indignantly, "You've been talking to the team, you --"

Apolo ignores him, "And then they play the mixtape together and the other person is instantly enamored and then they, you know?"

JR doesn't really know, seeing as he doesn't make a point to watch a ton of movies from the 80s (really strange soundtracks, seriously) but he gets it. "You know," he repeats, testing the words out in the roll of his tongue. "Maybe?" he says.

Apolo drums his hands on the steering wheel. "It's too early for this conversation," he says, nodding to himself.

"Wait," JR says, trying to think along the lines of Apolo's brain pattern or Travis's who talks about 80s movies like they are the holy grail of cinematic masterpieces, "did it work? The CD – mixtape – thing?"

"Sure," Apolo says, "not just that, but that helped."

JR nods like he completely understands the conversation, and Apolo leans over the stick and pulls JR down by the neck to bite at his jaw line and press against his lips.

JR feels disoriented and giddy and presses back into Apolo's mouth as best he can without getting stabbed in the rib by the stick shift.

Apolo pulls back far to fast and shifts in his seat, grinning too-bright for the early morning. JR has a matching expression, though, so it probably doesn't matter.

"I'm driving you home, right?" Apolo asks, shifting them out of the parking lot and flipping the radio to FM before JR notices.

Nickelback filters through the speakers and JR winces (almost fondly, because Apolo is already tapping his fingers along to the beat) before answering, "Yeah."

Apolo makes a warm noise and flashes a grin at JR. "I was thinking we could go for dinner."

–

The entire team is going to make _so_ much fun of him.


End file.
